Breitbart: A new report from a human rights group called Safeguard Defenders exposes China’s practice of extracting forced confessions from imprisoned activists, many of them foreign nationals.
The confessions are allegedly obtained with “threats, torture, and fear,” scripted and staged by the police, and employed as propaganda both inside China and abroad.
The report, titled “Scripted and Staged: Behind the Scenes of China’s Forced TV Confessions,” describes how the authorities control every detail of the confession process, from what the detainees wear to what they say. The lucky prisoners are basically actors in a TV show with exceptionally long and grueling shoots. The unlucky ones are beaten, drugged, threatened with longer jail sentences, intimidated with threats of harm to their families, or told they will be killed if they do not play along.
One man interviewed for the report said he was kept “alone and helpless” in such a “state of fear” that he contemplated suicide. Another said his hair turned white from “the enormous pressure and torture of it all.” more here
And this is surprising to…who?